SerpApi files to dismiss Google’s amended lawsuit again

Back in July, a federal court dismissed Google’s lawsuit against SerpApi. Google came back with an amended complaint, and now SerpApi has asked the court to throw that one out too.

Here’s what changed and what didn’t.

Google’s original complaint went after Google Shopping and Google Maps too those claims are gone now. What’s left is a much narrower argument about licensed content, mainly images that show up in Knowledge Panels.

Google is now claiming its content licensors gave it permission even asked it to use access controls. It points to four sources: two unnamed licensing deals, its agreement with Reddit, and its own privacy policy. But Google hasn’t filed any of these agreements with the court, and doesn’t quote a single line from them. It just describes what it thinks they say and asks the court to take its word for it. None of the four sources are even alleged to mention anti-bot tech, automated access, or SearchGuard. And a privacy policy isn’t a copyright license it’s just a notice about what data a company collects, with no mention of copyright at all.

One small but telling detail: the only specific content Google names in its entire complaint is two old photos one of Babe Ruth from 1921, one of Willie Mays from 1951. SerpApi says the first is clearly public domain, and the second is no longer under copyright either.

What hasn’t changed is what SerpApi actually does something it’s been open about long before this lawsuit started. SerpApi provides programmatic access to search results that anyone can already see using a regular browser. It doesn’t bypass logins, access private accounts, or pull non-public data. It doesn’t claim ownership of the content either everything stays available on the original public websites.

At the core, this case comes down to one legal question: the DMCA protects technology that controls access to copyrighted work. Google isn’t the copyright holder of what shows up in its results it’s just the platform surfacing it. And reading a public webpage that any browser can already load doesn’t meet the legal definition of “circumventing” anything.

For SerpApi’s customers, nothing changes. Same APIs, same coverage, same legal protections as before.

SerpApi has published its new motion, along with a side-by-side comparison of what Google changed between its two complaints, so people can read it and draw their own conclusions.